Three Is A Crowd
by emerald sorceress
Summary: There were three people in this relationship. Herself, the Doctor and The Memory of Rose Tyler.Because you can't compete with the ghost of True Love. Post Doomsday. 10/Rose 10/OC onesided


**Disclaimer:** None of it's mine. I do not own Doctor Who because if I did, Rose and the Doctor would be together. Forever.

Written in a moment of bitterness about the last episode of Doctor Who, I poured out all my angsty feelings and made someone else suffer.

**Pairings:** 10/Rose 10/OC one sided

**There were three of them in the relationship – herself, the Doctor, and Her.**

-#-#-

When he'd saved her life (she'd been about to have her brain sucked dry by a creature whose name she couldn't even pronounce) and offered to let her accompany him in his TARDIS, she'd jumped at the chance.

Space travel?

Time travel?

Who in their right mind would turn down that offer?

But if she was truly being honest with herself she'd made her mind up after looking in his eyes.

_Please don't leave me alone I can't do this on my own I'm so lonely oh so lonely I'm drowning by myself shaking and no-one's there to help me and She's gone and there's so much pain and I'm lost please please say yes and be there I need someone anyone to fill the aching space where there should be Her and please say..._

"Yes."

The Doctor himself was an enigma.

A smile that he could turn on and off like a light bulb.

The glint in his eye when he'd done something extremely clever and naughty and was just waiting for her to figure out what it was so they could go and defeat the bad guy.

The man embodied Charisma.

And if there had been a sadness that shrouded him, that couldn't be hidden even by the smile that sometimes seemed on the edge of manic… if she'd thought that she could take it away, then perhaps that was another reason she had gone with him.

It had been a foolish thought, she realised now. She'd always been terribly romantic.

But Naïve.

-#-#-

She hadn't noticed anything was wrong for the first few days as he'd taken her on her first journey. They'd gone to a planet where the sea sang a song of love and loss, where mermaids were real and the beach was sentient. It was strange to sit on sand that talked to you, with shells that actually whispered in your ear when you picked them up.

She'd laughed, enjoying the music and the sun and the whole weirdness of the thing and she'd turned to the Doctor to say thank you and noticed he wasn't even next to her anymore. He was standing a little way off, staring at the sea. She'd walked over to him and touched his arm.

"Doctor? Are you alright?"

"Dårlig ulv stranden." Lost, trance like, staring at someone she couldn't see in a memory that she didn't share.

"Sorry?" Confusion, anger, why did She have to intrude on them now? Irrational hate. _Go away! Leave him alone! _

He'd shaken himself out of it and grinned at her – that manic grin again that didn't touch the hollowness in his eyes- and raced her to the TARDIS. She'd tried to put it out of her mind and for the next few days they'd drifted in the Vortex whilst the Doctor did a few minor but vital repairs.

And if she'd caught him standing with his hands on the console, staring into the Vortex, eyes burning and tears tracking down his face…well she hadn't said anything and left him to his grief.

She'd wandered off round the TARDIS trying to explore the places where she hadn't been before. She'd always liked walking around the ship. There was always somewhere new to find and she tried every door handle she came to.

And if there was one room in the ship where she couldn't get into then she'd quietly walked away and never mentioned it to him either.

-#-#-

It was when they had been going out of the door of the TARDIS one day, perhaps a month or so after she'd first come on board that he'd seemed to automatically reach down for her hand.

She'd given it to him willingly, wondering if this was to be the beginning of their relationship – where she could help him overcome whatever, whoever he'd lost. Their hands had linked, his strong, lean fingers locking with hers, and he'd turned to her about to say something, his smile genuine this time, warmth and love gleaming in his eyes.

But then he'd looked down at their joined hands and she'd watched the smile slide from his face, his expression confused, as if he was wondering why the size and the shape and the texture was all wrong. Why it didn't feel right. He'd dropped her hand abruptly, and she'd watched it fall back to her side in slow motion, hanging limply by her side.

He'd pushed the door open and glossed over it as if it had never happened- but she couldn't forget.

Wouldn't.

And as she'd gazed out at the pyramids of Ancient Egypt being built, she'd wished desperately that her hand had been the right one.

-#-#-

She thought things had got better after that. She'd realised she'd been deluding herself, but then she'd been sick with love, had fallen head over heels for the Doctor, wishing in vain for him to feel the same. But now, now that she knew nothing could happen with him, with a damaged, broken man, whose heart clearly belonged to someone else, she set about the task of repairing her own heart.

They formed an unspoken agreement.

She ignored his strange moments of vacancy, when she'd find him standing around his ship staring at private memories, ever present ghosts, a sad, half smile gracing his beautiful features. She wept for him when he couldn't, crying into her pillow at night, or the tea towel in the kitchen, and claiming it was the onions she'd been cutting, or sometimes openly in the street, her tears mixing with the rain falling down her cheeks, and soaking her clothes.

He in turn subtly ignored her baby steps backwards in their relationship, as she retraced the path that had led to her heart slowly bleeding. She toned down the flirting until it was completely gone from the conversations they shared. She stopped dressing up to please him; because it wasn't as if he noticed what she wore these days anyway. Carefully shredded the dozen or so notes she'd written secretly to him and never given, that professed her love for him and her undying devotion. And in the end she stopped caring romantically for him that way.

Or at least she believed she had.

-#-#-

One day when they'd come back triumphant after freeing the enslaved of populace of Danato-opuay he'd kissed her.

Really kissed her.

And she'd realised that all the hard work she had done in trying to mend her heart had been a waste of time. With one kiss he'd managed to undo her.

She had been ecstatic.

Hadn't questioned it.

Finally, she had broken down through his state of mourning. He had found what he needed to get over his loss.

Finally she had won and she gloried in her triumph.

_He's mine_ _and I'm here now and you can't have him you're just a ghost just a memory and in time he'll forget you_ _and he's got me me me and I'm real and solid and you can never have him back because we belong together forever and I'll make him better and I love him and he loves me he really does..._

Oh, how wrong she had been.

-#-#-

Now that physical contact had been made, she found that he was desperate for it. That night she'd taken him back to her bed and held him as he made love to her frantically, desperately, as though he expected her to vanish and disappear before his eyes.

And then he'd closed his eyes.

She'd wanted to _scream_ in frustration.

He never opened his eyes. Even with the lights off in the dark, when all she could see was the faint outline of his body, she _knew_ he had his eyes screwed tightly shut.

But she didn't say anything. She already knew the answer why, why he couldn't bear to look down at her and see the features that he was so hungrily imagining replaced with her own.

She loved him.

But oh, how she hated him.

-#-#-

One night she'd slipped from the bed and padded along the corridor instantly finding the room that hadn't opened. Her fingers had stretched out to touch the golden handle, but it had clicked softly open before they could even touch it. She'd stepped inside, the warm dim light of the TARDIS making it glow gently.

It was Her room.

It was a rather large space, with blushing rose pink walls, filled with dark oak furniture, odd baubles and bits of knick knacks. Pictures were tacked up on a board next to a dressing table, where make-up lay neatly arranged; a stark contrast to the clothes thrown haphazardly over the back of the chair, and which crept onto the floor by the bottom of it's legs.

But her eyes had been drawn to the double bed in the middle of the room, with two bedside tables either side, and a solitary photo bordered in a plain silver frame on the right side. She'd crept further in and picked it up gently, fingers framing the young blonde-haired, grinning woman who was wrapped around the Doctor, head resting in the crook of his neck, and smiling at the camera. The Doctor's hair was ruffled and he was gazing adoringly at her, about to press a kiss to the top of her head, completely unaware that the moment was about to be captured for ever.

Swallowing down the nausea rising in her throat she'd realised this was also His room. That he slept here too – surrounded by the last tangible things he had of Her.

She'd stepped back and hit a hard unyielding body. She'd turned round but the apology died on her lips, as she'd glanced at his stony expression.

"Get out," he'd murmured, with a quiet intensity.

She'd stood frozen until he'd screamed at her to leave and she'd dashed from the room to have the door slam behind her. She'd run back to her own room, seeking comfort, only to find the remains of their hurried coupling on her bed, the crumpled sheets a slap in the face.

It was in that moment that her heart, the crushed bloody pulp that she had been left with, truly said goodbye to him.

-#-#-

Things had changed. She had broken the unspoken taboo, or perhaps he had, or maybe they'd done it together, but things were now irreparable.

All she felt was a cold sort of numbness inside.

She'd thrown the dirty sheets into the washing machine to rid all memory of their night together, and watched as the water scrubbed and scrubbed at the white linen, 'til it was clean once more.

But never as pure as it had been.

She'd washed her skin until it was red and raw in the shower, letting the water clean her until it stung her tender skin and she let it, welcoming the punishment.

She'd traced her features on the steamed up mirror.

_I'm sorry I'm sorry I didn't mean to hurt you I didn't mean to hurt him why can't you see that I love him why can't he see that I love him please forgive me I'm so sorry_

And watched as another woman's face gazed back sadly at her, tears tracking down her face and suddenly she'd felt ashamed. Ashamed that she'd despised her, this other woman _blonde with just the hint of golden light in her eyes _who shared her pain and her love and now shared her heartbreak too.

_In the end_ _we're the same and he's broken us both and neither of us can have him and now we're both alone._

The TARDIS had beeped suddenly then and she'd glanced away for just a second.

But when she looked back only her own empty eyes gazed back at her.

-#-#-

Packed bag slung over one shoulder, she'd casually mentioned she was leaving as he knelt fiddling with the TARDIS control panel with his sonic screwdriver.

He'd looked up, blinking and had looked intensely at her for one moment, as if truly seeing her for the first time. And then it was gone, and his unseeing stare was back in place, as he'd nodded curtly at her words and gone back to fixing whatever it was that was broken.

She'd attempted one last ditch effort.

"S…she," stumbling on the words, she had forced them out of her mouth, "Wouldn't have wanted you to be like this."

There was no acknowledgement that he had heard her.

"Doctor," she'd pleaded quietly. "You're destroying yourself over a ghost, over something you can't change." His hands had gone still on the panel and she'd hurried on, hoping she would have some kind of impact.

"Sometimes love hurts. A whole lot. And there's nothing you can do about it, 'cos that's life and it's harsh and cruel. But after the pain things get better and you can…"

"Stop," he'd said gently, but she could hear the well of water threatening to break as his voice trembled. "Please stop."

There was a dreadful kind of silence and she'd sighed softly to herself.

"I'm so sorry," she'd said and stepped hesitantly towards him, as he'd crumpled to the floor, crying silently. Her hand had reached out to touch him, to offer him comfort as her own heart curled up whimpering its final goodbye's.

But he'd stilled as her hand hovered just above his shoulder and had shaken his head.

"Go!" He'd whispered harshly and she'd fled the ship, running to the outside and closing the door behind her, before resting her head on it as the tears tracked down her cheeks.

And she'd thought, just for a moment before the ship faded out, she'd heard him calling a name, a cry, a sob in the song of the lonely angel, to whoever could hear him.

"_Rose!"_

Then there nothing but a pile of crackled old leaves where the police box had once stood and an echo of the name, sounding in the alley, ringing in her head.

And she'd wondered, between the two of them, who was more damaged.

-#-#-


End file.
